The Songbird Cannot Sing
by Reincarnated Poet
Summary: Though I despise summaries...a teaser He stole away their families, their free time, their hopes, their dreams. He stole away their aspirations and showed them into their fears. But what did he steal away, really? A Hieicentric one shot


Reincarnated Poet: Hello my freaky darlings! This is a one shot that I did from the point of view of our dark and brooding forbidden child as he lays dying. These are his final thoughts, in his final moments.

And the Songbird cannot Sing

There is a songbird in the tree to my right, but he will not sing, no he will not sing. He sits there and stares down at me, his eyes big and full of something. Judgment. Yes, that is what lurks there. Judgment.

How could he sing for one such as I? A forbidden monster from a forbidden land. I have shunned all those who have ever shown me kindness, and I have destroyed all those who have ever not. I am a monster of the worst kind, a betrayer far more deadly than a dagger, for I didn't stab those I destroyed, no. Those I killed, I stabbed, but those I have destroyed, those lives that I made unhappy and grievous, I did not stab. I simply spoke, or as the case may come to show, I did not speak.

I stood by and let a sister mourn the loss of a brother that stood next to her for months, no years. I stood by and let her die inside as she was told, by my own lips, that her brother had left her behind and had died. I stood by and watcher her once warm heart freeze colder than even her body.

And if one life wasn't enough, I brought that poor boy into my world, my world of demons, thieves, and murderers. I was the one who stole away his love and threatened her life. I was the one who caused his heart to break as I broke her skin. I was the one who would have turned her into a mindless beast, had I not been so weak. That boy broke, little by little. He changed and morphed and left his life behind him, a life that promised a loving wife, a difficult but rewarding lifestyle, and a family.

"Yes a family." I hear echo in my ears, and my eyes dart over the forest that surrounds my weakening form, but there is nothing there. Simply that songbird, perched in the tree. "You stole away that family." My eyes dart around again, but it is the songbird that speaks. "You murderous traitor, you stole away a family."

"I tried to help them, in the end." I cry back at the bird, whose tone and the angry way it spits its words makes me defensive. "I tried not to be-" The bird is right. The songbird is right.

I'd always hoped that someday, I would work up the courage to tell all of them. To tell them that they weren't a waste of my time, my energy. No, but I was too stubborn for that. I believed them pathetic and not worth the blood I could shake from my sword. In all actuality, I was afraid. It was I that was not worth their time. If I admitted that they were worth mine, who was to say they wouldn't realize the truth. I couldn't take being left again, not again.

"Not worth your time." It cries at me, flapping its multicolored wings furiously. "Not worth your, the family you stole." I let my head lay back upon the ground and listen to its shrieking cries. I try and relax for soon the songbird will leave, as all things do.

I've been left so many times, and I don't mean my mother or the thieves I once referred to as family. Looking back now, that was a blasphemy. An injustice to the word. No, I don't refer to them. I mean the others. Those not worth my time. Those whose family I stole away.

"Stole away their family." Yes, the bird is still there, but it has calmed. I did steal their family, their chance at happiness. But somehow they were stronger than my darkness. They found a way to survive as I could not. Yusuke took the human girl, Kurama had his mother and finally his wife, Kuwabara and my sister. They all found their happiness, despite my actions. I stole from them nothing but time, precious time with their family. I stole their family.

"Time." It chirps. "Time with their family." I can only think of its words now, for the songbird cannot lie. They were together, all that time. In their hearts, and in their heads. What did I steal really? A cheap physicality? Yes, too weak to even steal away their time, all I stole away was their space.

"Stole their family." It echoes again.

"I stole away nothing from them." I tell it, wanting it to simply go away and let me die in the peace that I don't deserve.

"Stole away their family. Stole away their family to the Makai." It chirps again, head and body bobbing from side to side. I did. I drove the fox and the detective to go to the Makai. To that tournament of waste. I went and they followed. They always followed.

"Followed to the Makai." The bird chirped.

"I know!" I yell and can almost pry my body from the ground enough to sit up, but the effort makes my head spin and I fall back down. "I know I stole them away. I know." The bird is trying my patients, but what am I to do against the truths of this world or the next? Perhaps this is my punishment. Perhaps this is my atonement for my sins.

"Not them." The bird all but sings. "Didn't steal them." I close my eyes, exhaustion taking root in my body. The bird is wrong. I stole them away from their families. Made them all worry. "Made them worry." The bird repeats. "Worry about family." Yes, I made them fear for the lives of those they call family. Yes, I stole them away from what they knew to follow me into more danger than they deserved.

"Stole the family away." The bird chirped. "Made them worry." It called again. "Made them follow." I all but cried out at the damnable creature to make it stop. "Made them follow family."

That made my eyes fly open and my heart ache. Made them follow their family. "Stole away, made them worry, made them follow family." The bird cawed quietly. I stole away their family? I made them follow their family? I took no one with me. No one to follow. I went alone. I...made them...follow their family.

The words hurt both my head and somewhere else, but I shut them out. Death is here now. The death that I have ran from. The death that took all of them, before it took me. It is waiting, and when it arrives I will have to answer to those whose family I stole. I will have to answer.

"Answer to your family." The bird calls again, and my eyes shoot open. It is no longer on the tree, it is on the ground, next to me. It is old and battered. Its once multicolored feathers are black now, black as my own hair, and there on its chest, a patch of white. But it is still the songbird, but its voice is still the same. Its eyes open as mine do, but they shine not with judgment as I though. They shine with tears as it repeats itself. "Answer to my family." It says. "Answer to our family." As the words ring in my ear, the bird is gone. The bird is gone, and it is just me, laying on the ground.

"Answer to my family." I try the words on my tongue, and though they taste unfamiliar, they are comfortable. I feel a smile spread across my face as my world goes black for the last time. My family. I stole away my own family, and its time I answered to them.

Well my freaky darlings, this is the end of this ride, but there's more to come soon. I am thinking about writing another one shot tonight that the muses demand my brain focuses on. My first full length chapter story will be posted soon. I'm about halfway through typing it out and it is entirely planned out. Hope you enjoyed this. Review if you liked it. Review if you hated it. I tend to ask reviewers if they want a sequel, or what they would like to see happen in a story. So...

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. Please?


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